After hours of deliberations, the jury has found Dr. Robert Ferrante, the University of Pittsburgh medical researcher accused of poisoning and killing his wife with cyanide, guilty of first-degree murder.

As a former Allegheny County coroner, Dr. Cyril Wecht has helped prosecutors put people accused of homicide behind bars. But on Wednesday he’ll try to help a University of Pittsburgh medical researcher accused of fatally poisoning his wife avoid that fate.

The first two defense witnesses in a University of Pittsburgh medical researcher’s homicide trial on Monday targeted the prosecution’s central claim that the researcher purposely poisoned his neurologist wife with cyanide last year.

The defense was expected to begin calling witnesses after a final prosecution witness in the trial of a University of Pittsburgh medical researcher charged with poisoning his neurologist wife with cyanide last year.